Originally created as the basis of a magazine front cover under the title of ‘Resistance’

I wished to use a universally recognisable signal or sign, that anyone would be able to ‘read’ visually.

I do love the honesty behind the work of Photographer Sally Mann and although I wished to use paint for this, I wished to bring some of her influence to the piece.

The reference material I looked at led me in the direction of children and resistance. It is the first experience we have of this feeling. Children are put into routines, dressed up, made to be quiet, funny or clever as the situation allows and really it’s a lot to cope with. Resistance and it’s signs are at their most basic in children, and I felt that made them a good tool to get the message across.

As I conducted the research for this piece, I came across Handala. He is the creation of Naji Al-ali which resonates with the grateful mother in me. Grateful because he represents things in this world that my children, currently do not have to worry about. The following quote from Naji Al-Ali struck a chord which I felt I needed to somehow represent in my own image.

“His name is Handala and he has promised the people that he will remain true to himself. I drew him as a child who is not beautiful; his hair is like the hair of a hedgehog who uses his thorns as a weapon. Handala is not a fat, happy, relaxed, or pampered child.”

—Naji Al-Ali

Whilst the worries of my own children are few and safe, they still have their own growing to do. Seeking out the who, what & why of their own lives and sometimes we clash. Using paint by numbers as an iconic reference to careful, quiet, ordered moments of childhood, I painted with acrylics, used lots of texture and the wrong colours. This is not a child in her Sunday best doing something well behaved and quiet but a real person, with ideas and a sense of self and this comes through in the image.